urged by advisers to initiate low-level or clandestine approaches, and

there is growing recognition in Washington that the policy of

ostracising Hamas is counter-productive. A tested course would be to

start ­contacts through Hamas and the US intelligence services, similar

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to the secret process through which the US engaged with the PLO in the

1970s. Israel did not become aware of the contacts until much later.

One of Obama's main pledges throughout his campaign was his willingness to negotiate with enemies, something he contradicted when announcing he would not negotiate with Hamas. I don't think we should expect groundbreaking policy differences with an Obama administration, but the nuances do count, and any sort of contact will be beneficial for the prospect of long term peace.

How the UK voting public respond to Theresa May's calculated decision not to appear in the leader's debate will give us an interesting insight into how humans more generally might react to the affront of being made irrelevant by artificial intelligence.